SB: I'm excited to have new material, because it gets pretty old playing the same songs over and over again. But also I've got a new band, so that makes things fresh for me. So what's new in the Pitchfork office? Any good records lately?

Pitchfork: [laughs] Ha, uh, that new Animal Collective record's pretty good. Seems like they've been building to something, and this might be it. How about you? What have you been listening to?

SB: Honestly, I haven't heard a whole lot of good stuff. I don't have the time as much as I used to to listen to records. I listen to the Joanna Newsom record a lot this year, that was good. Somehow the Beatles records just always stays by the sink where I wash dishes and listen to records, with the Beefheart records. Oh, I did hear that Panda Bear record, I like that record, that was good. But yeah, I haven't heard a lot of new stuff. That's why I keep checking out your site!

Pitchfork: You've spent a lot of time in Chicago before, right?

SB:
Yeah, I've done a lot of recording here, played a couple times. I mixed the last record here. I love it here. I've got a lot of friends, good experiences.

Professor Murder [Balance Stage; 5:15 p.m.]

Photos by Jason Bergman

Interview: Professor Murder | [Interview by Julian Hattem]

Pitchfork : Have you guys been around the festival? Seen any shows so far or anything coming up you'd like to see?

Mike Bell-Smith : We were here last night. Saw some of GZA, Sonic Youth, both totally rad. Today...

Tony Plunkett : Who's on now? Is that Grizzly Bear?

Pitchfork : Grizzly Bear's on right now, yeah.

MBS : That sounds fucking huge. But we want to see Clipse. Battles.

Pitchfork : I heard that mixtape you did with Caps & Jones: How'd that come about? Have you been in contact with them for long?

MBS : They've been friends of ours for a while, and we've always been very supportive of what they did and vice versa and they knew that we were interested in making music that maybe didn't necessarily follow a standard rock album format kind of thing. So it seemed like something they were into and we were into also, so it just made sense.

Jesse Cohen : We went into the studio and recorded-- like, we ran tape on a lot of jams. We cut them up into loops and we delivered them the loops and let them do whatever they want.

Pitchfork : I heard this rumor, and I don't know if it's ridiculous, but Tony, that you were asked to play for the John Mayer Trio.

TP : [ laughs ] Yeah, I got to get that off. That's on Wikipedia.

Pitchfork : Not true at all?

TP : No, I think John Mayer is looking for a bassist who can probably play without looking at the frets [ laughs ]. I don't know, maybe not.

Pitchfork : You coming back tomorrow too?

JC : I'm not.

Pitchfork : You heading back to New York?

JC : I'm actually driving up to Madison with my girlfriend because we're using this as a vacation. I wanted to come tomorrow but we've got to go see her aunt and stuff. I don't, I'm really excited about this and other things. What else can we talk about with Professor Murder? Oh, we're playing tonight-- an after-party at the Hideout. This didn't really make it into the paper-- Professor Murder's not playing, but a side project called King Oppression. And that's like a live hip-hop cover band for Professor Murder that plays Professor Murder songs over rap and dancehall beats that we like.

Pitchfork : Any beats I would know about?

MBS : We do some of the "85 Riddim", which was the one [in] "Ghetto Story" by Baby Cham, "Chinkuzi Riddim", we put that on the internet, that was an mp3 that was around a little bit.

Pitchfork : Are all of you in King Oppression?

MBS : I think, I don't know. Andy, are you going to play tonight?

Andy Craven : I think I'm going to sit out tonight.

MBS : He might be our Professor Griff. He's just going to stand in the back. He's going to videotape and dance. Like that guy-- I want to be the guy in the GZA crew who just does that [ laughs ].

Pitchfork : The white dude in the GZA t-shirt in back?

MBS : He videotaped for like half the set and the rest of the time he was checking his phone.

JC : Yoko Ono was like...I work with people who were like, "Where you going this weekend?" Because I'm an archivist, I work in a library, with a lot of older people. And I was like, "Well I'm playing a music festival," and they were like, "Oh, cool, what kind of festival?" I was like, "Well, Yoko Ono is headlining." And they all know Yoko Ono-- better to say her, I don't think I could explain who anyone else that we're playing with is. But they heard Yoko Ono and it was like, "Oh, this is an actual legitimate thing." [ laughs ] We're not going to Chicago to play a dance bill with, like, nine bands and it's a pay as you go or whatever show. They made the point that it's a real thing.

MBS : But that would be fine.

JC : That would be fine, yeah; it was like last time we went out on the road...

Pitchfork: Just from seeing pictures of you guys, I thought [guitarist] Brent [Hinds] would be the most savage member of the band, mostly because of his face tattoo. But after seeing your show, I think it might be you. Do you practice making faces or moves in the mirror?

Troy Sanders: No, not at all. Our music and our live show and everything that we embody is basically just every emotion under the sun that we bottle up and channel out through our music. Off the stage, we're four quite normal goofballs. Our music and our stage show is very intense; it's very demanding. But it's basically because we choose to write this type of music that embodies everything dark and deep and brutal about life that we encounter, which are the same things everyone else encounters. We just take all this, and we channel it through what we call Mastodon.

That's why it's like, "Why do you guys scream all the time and play this brutal music that you want to kill yourself to?" It's like, "Well, we don't intend to do that. This is our art form. This is our outlet." If we didn't have this outlet, we would probably be even more disturbed.

But Brent is a savage beast. It depends on what kind of show [it is]. This art form of touring conjures different emotions every single day. I was up there having a great time, glad to be here in front of 10,000 people under the sun. I've had a great weekend, a great year. And it sounded okay to me on stage. It felt good. I was just going for it, getting it all out, sweating out all the bad stuff.

Pitchfork: I saw that your daughter was here. Is she a fan of the band?

TS: Oh yeah. She knows all the song titles; she knows our set list. She's been in two of our videos. She tours with us, small spurts here and there.

Pitchfork: Are you the only member of the band without any tattoos?

TS: Uh... visible, yeah. I'm a freak.

Pitchfork: So I heard you guys went to the restaurant Kuma's Corner last night, right?

TS: I went there last time we played Chicago. The rest of my dudes went there last night.

Pitchfork: So you didn't go last night?

TS: I did not go last night. But I have been there before, and it was delicious.

Pitchfork: They have a burger named after you guys.

TS: I ate it. It was amazing. I really enjoyed it. I felt bizarre ordering my own sandwich, but I figure if your band gets to the point where you have a sandwich named after you, you've done something right. Everybody wants to grow up and be a sandwich.

Pitchfork: What does the Mastodon burger consist of?

TS: You have your choice of meat burger, chicken breast, or veggie patty. It really caters to everyone. I went with the chicken, because I just wanted to try it. It comes on a pretzel roll, which is like half pretzel, half bun. It's amazing; I had never had one before. And the condiments were bacon, barbecue sauce, cheddar, and frizzled onions. Next time I go, I'm going to get the Neurosis burger. They've got the Neurosis burger, the Mastodon burger, the Maiden melt, the Slayer sandwich.

Pitchfork: You guys met Metallica recently, right?

TS: Yeah, we just met them on Sunday.

Pitchfork: And you've played with Slayer?

TS: Oh we've played over 150 shows with Slayer.

Pitchfork: What's it like meeting those dudes?

TS: We're friends, like, "Hey Tom [Araya], what's up?" "Hey Troy."

Pitchfork: Is that weird?

TS: It was at first, man, because those are the people [whose music] I grew up with, but now we're on a first-name basis with them. We've done six tours, over 150 shows.

Pitchfork: What about the guys in Metallica?

TS: They're cool as hell. They told us to keep flying the flag.

Pitchfork: So the torch was passed.

TS: It's not necessarily that the torch was passed, but a piece of the torch was passed. And those guys had heard of our band before. They get to pick their opening bands. They were on stage watching us for the three shows we did last week, and I'll tell ya, that's a little nervous, man. I would not be here today if Metallica didn't exist, and now they're on stage watching our band and then we're hanging out drinking with Lars until four in the morning.